An Open Blog 5: Funding Clarification and Other Financially Motivated Questions

I was sent some minutes from the Liberty meeting on the topic of Camping and Retreat Ministries (CRM).  They were helpful to me, but some things were hard to understand without some clarification.  I may call the conference office, then again maybe not.  (To be honest, I see some of this as an exercise in futility and I'm growing tired quickly..)

How have camps been funded?
CRM funding has come from three sources (depending on how you care to divide them.)  Apportionments, User Fees, Direct Contributions.
Apportionments made up about 2/3 of the funding in 2002 and shrank to about 1/3 or less of the funding in 2012.
User Fees are camper fees and group rental fees.  They made up about most of the remaining income.
Direct contributions were from churches, UMM, UMW and individual donors who chose to give to the operations of the camps.  Most of which were site specific and not to the conference CRM for operations.
There are a few other sources that didn't make up a large percentage and these are worth mentioning as there will need to be some conclusion to the future use.  Each of the sites received funds from various endowments.  Some of these were as small as Certificates of Deposits that may fund one or two camper fees for children from a particular county and specific to the camp they could attend.  Others were as large as the Agnew Trust that funded about $30,000 annually for the operation of Jo-Ota.  I'm glad I won't be involved in figuring out what happens to those.

What happens to the property?
Now that's a good question  I'm going to need a legal expert in church law to answer that.  However, it may not be as "easy" as reading and interpreting the Book of Discipline. (BOD)  It also depends upon the Discipline's bearing on the separately incorporated CRM.
Another issue may be covenant restrictions made at the time of donation.  Now we're going to have to bring in History and Archives to help us out (I'm so glad I've invested in that used book sale at Annual Conference each year.  They finally are going to have something more to do then just archive stuff, now they can do some important research.)  The stories I've heard may only be lore or legend.  However, I recall that the Barrow family that donated Jo-Ota's property stated that if the property ever ceased being used by Methodists for camping that it would go back to the family for ownership.  If no family could be found, it became the property of Clarence UMC.  Finding that deed may be impossible as the donation goes back to the 1950's.  I've heard the same about the Whitener family and Blue Mountain.  Part of the Whitener family worshipped at Salem-In-Ladue when I was an associate there.  If they are still there they probably would remember as they were adults when that property was given.  What a hornets nest.
Does anyone know anything about either of these?  How about Wilderness and Galilee?

What happens to the funds if property is sold?
Likely a money grab.  One suggestion that was put before us was the idea of one central camp instead of four regional ones.  A very quick estimate of the value of our property (pessimistic as this was done post 2008) led us to believe that the cost of constructing one camp that could do what we were doing at 4 would be about $3-4 million short of our sale.  Property is expensive, construction is expensive.  The conference was participating in a theology of scarcity and we were getting mixed messages from the conference staff as to what we could and couldn't do.  So we dropped it.
So what happens to the funds?  According to the BOD, a local church that sells property can only used the funds for debt reduction or for capital improvements.  I don't know if that's the case with conference property.  If so, then we can pay down the cost of the addition to the conference office and endow it for the future since that would be the only other conference owned property.  (Yeah, I confess, I put that in just to stir up the hornets nest a little more.  I'll see Father John at the high school football game tonight and seek absolution for that one.)

Can we just have our weeks of camp somewhere else?
Immediately after hearing of this change I started researching other sites.  I found that some other event directors had done the same.  It appears we're too late.  The late hour of this decision puts us about 18 months out on camp availability.  At least I found this true with the sites I called that I thought were up to the standards we had at our four sites (standards that must have fallen over the last two years if they can't even seem to secure insurance for the sites as indicated during the Liberty meeting.)

Do the sites really need $2,500,000 in capital funds in the next year?
My answer will be very subjective, and I'll equivocate.  Yes and No.  The site directors were asked to share what they needed.  First, what do they need in the next year "must have to function effectively maintain basic services."  The second was "Longer Term (5 Years) must have to provide acceptable level of camping."  Finally, "Wish List."
I have spoken to two of the site directors and neither would have written their report the same way under threat of job loss and camp closure.  I've also read the one submitted by Jo-Ota.  Having camped there the last 14 years and been privy to the operational details as a CRM board member, I can say with confidence "NO" Jo-Ota didn't NEED all $873,800 they wrote in the three categories.
In years past we asked the Site Directors to go through this sort of exercise.  It helped us in planning for future capital campaigns... we were never given the green light on.
Are some of the things on the list important, YES.  If you want to have a camp you ought to have a camp, not allow that it go into disrepair and move us beyond usability.  Remember Epworth!!!???
Does Jo-Ota NEED a $700,000 retreat center, we could have done fine without it.  Does Wilderness NEED a $1,500,000 dining hall, probably, but they could have done something about it.
My point here is that the motivation for asking the question and the motivation for answering may have been at cross purposes.  If you want to show the futility of a camping ministry, ask how much it costs to run it.  If you want to have a premier facility ask what the Site Directors need the board to get busy doing.  Those were the two different motivations.  I think there was a lack of clear communication here that caused the board and Annual Conference staff to draw conclusions they wanted to draw.

I have one more post on the subject before I go silent.  If you have any questions, I'm glad to try to answer them for  you.  Thanks for reading.